We have talked about the unethical ways of the documentary – India’s Daughter – made about the Indian girl who was raped brutally in a moving bus. All sane and normal policies of depiction of death and rape in Europe in general and in particular in UK were jettisoned! Why was it necessary to provide voyeuristic details of how the entrails of the girl were taken out and then disposed off, for example? Or how the unrepentant rapist-killer thought she brought it upon herself? Also pertinent is how this documentary would impact the justice in this case as the case is sub-judice? In the first two articles we had discussed these in detail.

The writer maintains that there has been a concerted effort to “paint the Indian Male black” by the film maker, Leslee Udwin and her sponsors, including the BBC. It is now coming to light that the movie shown in “preview” to garner public support for it initially was a “balanced” version where it ended with “worldwide statistics highlighting violence against women from Australia to the US”. It had cited statistics in the West.

… its original version included evidence that in many countries in the West the incidence of rape is actually much greater. In Britain, the official Crime Survey for England and Wales 2014 estimated that there are 85,000 rapes every year, or one every six minutes. Equivalent US figures suggest that 1 per cent of all women are sexually assaulted each year, one every 25 seconds.

When the movie was shown on BBC and subsequently screened elsewhere, the entire reference to the Worldwide statistics were cut out.

But when the final version emerged, all this had been cut out. India was shown standing alone, as a country where rape is an exceptional problem.

As Christopher Booker very aptly puts it: “If there is a cultural problem here, it is the longstanding desire of the Western media to stereotype Indian males as sexualpredators”. All this has its own impact. As has been shared on Quora, a question that went viral soon after – a German professor refused internship to an Indian student because of “rape problem in India”.

What is a crime and happening – in far larger numbers actually – in the West as indeed the rest of the world, India has been instantly singled out as the lone society with such a national mindset. Imagine extrapolating Shylock’s mindset to that of European male ethos. Something of that proportion has been attempted with Indian men. And by at least one account – which was rather crudely articulated and exposed – it has succeeded. It will remain a mystery how many Indian men would face such discrimination covertly. We are the bearers of the rapist’s burden!

Recently, a colleague of mine got this reply from a Professor at the Liepzig University. What should he do?
He is being denied an internship opportunity just because he’s an Indian male and might rape?

I mailed the professor and got the following reply. Also I’ve decided to edit out the name of the professor.Update 2:
Here’s another screenshot where you can verify for the domain name of the university.

Later the University took out a press release condemning and distancing itself from the Professor’s actions. And the German ambassador to India apologized for the action of the Professor.

A country where a female professor is fearful for her women students because an Indian male “hound” is going to be amongst them, apparently would be one where women are completely safe and justice available completely. Right? WRONG!! It now seems that the German situation in rape cases is abysmal. Here is an interesting look:

When a rape court in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia acquitted the alleged rapist of a 15-year-old girl in 2012, women’s rights advocates were outraged.

The ruling found that saying no, or even screaming it, wasn’t enough to merit rape charges.

Now findings from a new study indicate that case was hardly unique, despite aEuropean initiative to step up efforts to stop violence against women.

The number of German rape cases ending in convictions has plummeted from 22 percent to 8 percent over the past 20 years, according to a study released by the Hanover-based Criminological Research Institute of Lower Saxony.

From 22% to 8% conviction rate – that’s an alarming drop. But even more alarming is how the German rulings now are siding with the rapists as opposed to the victim! If one goes deeper into the German society, one finds that this IS indeed representative of the German male mindset. Not just that, justice is now a function of your wealth in Germany.

As the article points out with respect to the attitudes toward women – things aren’t as hunky dory as they are made out to be.

There’s been virtually no change in popular attitudes about who should raise children — women, of course — according to another recent study.

Fewer men, and more women, today say they’d be willing to relocate for their partners’ careers than a decade ago.

And working women are still derided as “Rabensmuetter,” or “raven mothers” — an allusion to the belief that the birds push their chicks out of the nest before they’re able to fly.

That women are being treated unfairly and the definition of rape as a crime is heavily loaded against them is bad enough, that the prosperity of their state and location becomes a major criteria in resolution and conviction rates is a triple whammy.

Pfeiffer distinguishes the states in six groups. Three are in the top three are at the bottom. In the so-called poor countries the conviction rate of rapists is four percent, in the rich countries, it takes 24 percent of the charges for the procedure. At the same time the rapes have decreased over the financially better-equipped German states since 1994/95 to 30 percent. In the worst performers, it is the other way around. Here, the cases have increased by over 40 percent. (Translated into English from the article)

While going through all this – please keep in mind that the conviction rate in India are far higher than Germany. Admittedly, the conviction percentage in rapes is falling in India too. However, factoring in the huge population in India, the overall rates at the lowest levels are far higher than the German conviction rates at their best!

The conviction rates were 44.3 percent in 1973, 37.7 percent in 1983, 26.9 percent in 2009, 26.6 percent in 2010 and 26.4 percent in 2011.
A ‘Rape Map of India’ drawn up by the Wall Street Journalbroke down the number of rapes according to the region of the country, as well as the differing rates of conviction in each of them. Delhi’s conviction rate is estimated at 41.5 percent, Maharashtra at 20.3 per cent and Uttar Pradesh at 56.4 percent.

Unlike Germany, in India wealth of a state is not negatively correlated with the rape convictions. For, Maharashtra is a far richer state than UP is.

Look at all this with the understanding that Indian population is ~ 15 times that of Germany!!

If statistics are used properly, one sees that suddenly India seems like a heaven and Germany, a country of uncouth and rapist men where women have no recourse to justice in rape cases. In a rational world, it dawns on one that if an Indian women was to deny a German man an opportunity to work around her, then that would be quite in order given the national trends in that country!

But is that how things ought to work? Do we extrapolate Peter’s ethics and morality on Paul to feel secure in our limited mental cocoons?

I’ve been following your articles after Archana’s recommendation. Well, I look that BBC video from a different Drishtikone. I didn’t find it against Indian mindset or Indian males. In fact, I look at rape from a completely different angle: http://t.co/w3XJXxYqkn I think we should understand each others POV before entering into a discussion on the subject.

dr.viraj pradhan

I would like to tell my compatriot,Mr.Ravish Mani how Indian men are being looked at by the West after Jyoti Singh’s rape and so many other rapes which are still being committed.Is this film or any other article in any newspaper or any debate/discussion going to stop this menace?
Read Libby Purves article in The Times/NYT and other articles in Guardian where Indian men have been categorized as hyenas.In general, without any exceptions.Guardian calls this as India’s rape culture forgetting two important issues=For the faults of many judge not the whole and Judge not that ye be not judged.
This is our problem,which does need to be resolved and instead of comparing the statistics here and elsewhere,I would say-let the press here be careful.Let the electronic media also be careful while reporting.I am not suggesting suppression but if our data is being used against defining all Indian men.Ms.Libby Purves also referred to Bollywood movies where the hero rules supreme.They just want to shame us.This is not paranoia but the truth.Their rapes are not depicted in a documentary unless they are committed by blacks or Asians.They are being UNFAIR.Tomorrow,all Indians will be insulted when they visit foreign countries.I was questioned about Indian men’s rape tendency when I visited abroad.
The ideal way is to somehow prevent,and the press goes only to the police commissioner,home minister and judiciary( P.I.L.).This way this exploitation of details will stop.Ms.Udwin calls this movie a gift.How exactly is this a gift?She showed men standing beside the women.Did she do us a favor?Have the numerous reporters/editors there acknowledged that all Indian males are not hyenas or do not belong to a rape culture?Then she has not HELPED US AT ALL.Ms.Shobha Dey has written an excellent article in Mumbai’s TOI,where she just stops short of calling this movie ‘A SHAMELESS COMMERCIAL ACT” AND ADV.Indira Jaisingh has written a couple of days ago why this film is wrong.Ms.Jaisingh has been our Attorney General and is a feminist( so she won’t try to protect any man if he is guilty).The very fact that these criminals who are claiming that evidence against them is insufficient suddenly claim how right they were almost proves that even if they are hanged,their families will be funded.That’s what Ms.Udwin meant when she talked about permissions having been taken of the prisoners.You think for yourself now.Best Regards,

dr.viraj pradhan

Dear Mr.Kapoor, As you have promised,you have given this nice article.Please read Ms.Libby Purves’s article in the Times,where she dubs all Indians’ attitude hyena-like.Why are our jurnalists helping them by publishing news about rapes almost everyday?How does it stop rapes? Only the western media gets to use these against us.It is a shame that our Govt.is yet to evolve a plan to prevent and also make our tourist destinations safe.The tourist police have been mentioned but are they with the crowd or sitting in their cubicles and chitchatting?Regards,

morris98

“As Christopher Booker very aptly puts it: “If there is a cultural problem here, it is the longstanding desire of the Western media to stereotype Indian males as sexual predators”.”
Indian males by implication means Hindu males. The same media are going out of their way to distance average Muslim from Muslim terrorists. Obama does not want to use even the word Muslim in discussing terrorism. Rape is not a Hindu problem. On the other hand terrorism at present is almost exclusively Muslim problem.

Malai

“If there is a cultural problem here, it is the longstanding desire of
the Western media to stereotype Indian males as sexual predators”.

Eve teasing is a huge problem here in many parts of India. Do you think it would subside if dating and pre-marital relationships became culturally acceptable throughout all pockets of Indian society?

morris98

It may subside . But that may be a long way yet. Don’t forget, in our culture boys and girls grow up separately. And now that the western culture is slowly integrating that makes this transitional period difficult. Perhaps that is contributing to the problem of the day. But it has its own problem. There is no easy answer.

Malai

As long as the street sexual harasement (what we in India call eve teasing) continues, then the warnings to women in all the India Tourism books like Lonely Planet will continue to be issued. And why shouldn’t they? Women should know what they’ll be faced with on the trains, buses and in the streets of India.

HARRY

I somehow knew this will happen, now we all are being branded the sons of Satan.

Malai

Why aren’t Indians making documentaries about the crimes going on outside India? They could make thousands of them on child abuse cases in the US alone. And the Daily Mail claims pedophilia has seeped into the very fabric of UK’s political and entertainment segments. So Indians should expose all this to the world and do something to reverse the Anglo and American culture or genetics that is causing those people to abuse and exploits kids. We can call it “India’s gift to the United States and United Kingdom.”

Joe

go for it.

Malai

I’m on it! 😉

Myra Esoteric

Yeah this is not new from the media… the mindset of orientalism used to tar Japan as sexist, China as sexist, Egypt as sexist, now they’re tarring India. Smh…

sweta

A very well written piece….it is not fair to judge all Indian men for the crimes of a handful..the turning down of an Indian student was a sad fallout of the whole Nirbhaya documentary episode

Malai

Sweta this documentary does not at all juge all Indian men for those crimes. In fact it shows how millions of Indians, about half of them men, came out in protest against these horrific crimes committed against Ms. Singh and Mr.Pandey.

What is really troubling is in Mr.Pandey’s interviews which he gave the same year as these attacks, he says how he and Ms.Singh were lying in the road, her half dead and he bloody and bruised, and no car stopped to help them! Once police arrived people started to gather but no one helped them. They just stood around starring and asking them questions rather than taking them to a hospital. Even the police were debating which hospital to take them to, discussing the politics of districts, for about a half an hour before they took them to a hospital in their own van (not having called an ambulence) and even then, they didn’t take them to the closest hospital but to a far one!

The entire Mr. Pandey was begging for help and begging to be taken to hospital and all those idiots were just standing around talking!!!!!!!!!!!!

Could Ms. Singh’s life had been saved had someone been human enough to take them to the closest hospital as soon as possible????

Those cops and those by-standers are guilty too!

arun

Calling all Indian males(hindu males according to west) rapists is like calling all germans are Nazi,all americans are warmongers or all mexicans are drug addicts.Please don’t stereotype!! RAPE IS A GLOBAL PROBLEM!!